Mutational Landscape of TP53 Across Cancer Types

The TP53 gene is the most frequently mutated tumor suppressor in human cancers, but its mutation patterns vary across tumor types. Using data from cBioPortal (downloaded 9 August 2025), we analyzed 4,245 TP53 mutation events in 10,967 unique tumor samples from 32 cancer studies, covering 27 cancer types. Mutations were classified into missense, nonsense, frameshift, in-frame indels, splice-site variants, and fusions, and cancer types were grouped for comparative analysis. Missense mutations were most common, followed by nonsense and frameshift variants. Female reproductive and gastrointestinal cancers had the highest mutation burdens, while central nervous system tumors showed a higher proportion of missense events. These findings highlight both the ubiquity and cancer type–specific patterns of TP53 alterations, providing a reference for future functional and clinical studies.